Chapter I: The Pool

This is Christina, and she has no idea what's happening to her.

          Beautiful night cloaked my body, and I could feel it gliding over my skin as I hurtled through the sky. I scanned the trees fifty feet below with my raptor-like vision, eager to catch a glimpse of the magical place I was headed to. The low, smooth hum of my Hawk jetpack’s engine seemed to somehow soothe my bleeding soul, banishing the anxiety that had built up in the last couple weeks. I began to reflect on what had happened.

          Two weeks ago, I collapsed. There was no reason behind it; my legs just slipped out from under me and I was on the floor, out cold, right in the middle of a clothing store. A few minutes later, Aunt Mary found me, and I woke up the next day in a hospital bed. The doctors found that I was in perfect health, and they discharged me that night.

          I'd known as soon as I woke up in that bed that they'd made a mistake. There was something wrong with me. I could see every individual thread on the sheet of the bed from several feet away. I could sense how people were feeling based on the scent of the chemicals released by the glands in their bodies. I could pick out each person's heartbeat in the room with no difficulty. My muscles were stronger and my reflexes faster, always getting more so. Why? I didn't know. But whatever it was made me crave to be out every night, soaring over the trees to a place I kept seeing in my dreams.

          I sighted a break in the trees and began to descend. The ground rushed up to meet my feet and I touched down beside a shimmering pool of water, no more than fifty feet across. The flickering points of light in the violet-blue sky were flawlessly reflected in the smooth surface of the liquid, which appeared to glow from within. I slipped off my Hawk and drew closer, mesmerized. The tranquility of this place beckoned me forward until I was standing on the edge. My legs folded and I sat down, careful not to touch the water lest I disturb its glassy surface.

          I breathed in and held my breath for a moment before slowly letting it out. A metallic tang was in the air, a bit like the taste of a new penny, but different somehow. I drank it in as though it were the elixir of life. Sitting on the soft dirt of the bank with my legs crossed, I stared into the untouched water's depths. I felt like I was searching for something there, but all I could see was the reflected night sky; the water was impenetrable.

          I gazed at it, and the reflection was clear enough that it seemed like I was looking upside-down into another world. Its beauty held me in place, draining all ability of movement from my limbs, but if I cared at all, I ceased to in an instant. My body was at peace, and I imagined whatever it was inside of me humming a content little song about being here again. This place felt like home. I could feel the strange metallic scent coursing through my veins somehow, lifting away the loneliness and rejection I'd felt as long as I could remember. . . .

          My mother died while she was giving birth to me. That never happens anymore, it shouldn't ever happen, but it did. I remember confessing it to my best friend in elementary school, hoping she would console me and be there for me. No. She was afraid of me after that. She told me that I killed my own mother, and I was unable to deny it. She is dead because of me.

          I had never been like other people. A few friends had come and gone, but they never stuck for too long. I couldn't relate to them. I'd try my very hardest to understand them, always to no avail. Now I was sixteen, I'd never had a crush on a boy (or a girl, for that matter), never really bonded with another person, and murdered my own mother before I was completely born.

          The pool and the ring of trees surrounding it blurred. Slow, silent tears trickled down my cheeks, and my ears picked up the soft splashes they made as they struck the dirt. I struggled to blink them away, but they came in waves of warm and salty wretchedness. One slipped off my nose and into the water, disrupting the pattern of mirrored jewels of light in the darkness.

          The enchantment over my legs and arms was broken. I jumped to my feet, strapped on my Hawk, and took off, the rush of air drying the tears still on my face as I rocketed into the sky. My chest heaved, gulping in oxygen, and I pushed the jetpack faster. I had to get away. Even as I vowed never to return again, I know I would be back soon, the next night if possible.

Reviews

[ChloeKirk]

You really paint a picture. I can almost feel the cool night air. Looking forward to reading the next chapter.

[Katie de Lavani]

You really place the reader in the narrator's position, feeling her sorrow and being captured by the water's magnificence. Your imagery is beautiful, just like the character being able to point out every detail, you have given each reader the same abilities of sharpness. Well done. Can't wait to read more.